


Like Blazing Fire

by justanothersong



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe, Implied Child Abuse, M/M, Minor Character Death, Religious Conflict, Religious Guilt, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Scripture Reference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-13
Updated: 2013-05-13
Packaged: 2017-12-11 17:42:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/801376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanothersong/pseuds/justanothersong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written on prompt via Tumblr user <a href="http://http://izzraphale.tumblr.com/">izzraphale</a>:<br/><i>literally all i want in life is an au where dean is the scruffy farmer boy who’s dad owns the stretch of land just on the edge of town and cas is the pastors boy who’s dad bans him from ever down going there because he thinks that they’re damn uncivilised but one day cas defies him out of curiosity and he meets dean all musty and dirty and they fall in sweet sweet love</i></p><p>Some liberties taken here and there. PLEASE NOTE: This story deals heavily with matters of the Christian church and scripture, and in some cases directly quotes scripture. The last chapter contains a sermon delivered by one of the characters. If this will offend you, please do not read. Thank you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The first time Castiel visited the farm that sat alongside the road out of town, he was eight years old. He hadn’t seen the fire himself, though he had noted the acrid smoke still hanging heavy in the air when he woke early that morning it happened. The sirens had died away by then, and most of the onlookers had scattered. His father had gone alone that morning, to see if he was needed, though it had been clear from the pained expression on the man’s face that he had hoped he was not. 

By the time Castiel visited the house he had glimpsed from time to time, driving past on his family’s evening mission trips or to see his cousins living one town over, most of the evidence of the fire was gone. There was siding missing and windows blown out, but the plywood covering it all hid the true cause of the damage. The gleaming blue tarp covering a portion of the roof could easily have been result of a storm or a bad leak, but Castiel knew better.

They stood on an old wooden porch, the scent of ash still faint in the air, with a hollow-eyed man leaning against the doorframe. He looked tired and unkempt, face awash in days of whiskers and the odor of sweat mixed with beer clinging to his clothes. His expression remained blank as Castiel’s father spoke in a gentle voice, offering his wife’s best casserole dish, covered loosely in a kitchen towel. The man at the door blinked and nodded, but didn’t speak, and that is when Castiel noticed the boy standing just behind him, peeking out from behind his legs.

Wide green eyes and a freckled nose, younger than Castiel’s meager eight years, and quietly sullen and serious. Castiel thought he might have seen the boy in town before, perhaps at the annual Independence Day parade, or at the Harvest Carnival that previous Halloween. But the boy had been different then, smiling, and without the heavy weight that seemed to droop his shoulders. When the older man – the green-eyed boy’s father, had to be – didn’t make a move towards the offered dish, the boy stepped forward quietly and accepted it, mumbling a quiet thanks. The sudden cry of an infant pierced the stillness of the Sunday afternoon, and the boy’s head snapped back towards the sound; he said nothing more as he hurried towards it, dish still in his hands, and Castiel listened as the infant began to quiet.

His father tapped him on the shoulder and gave the hollow-eyed man a nod, before gently turning his son to head down the stairs. Castiel took his father’s hand as they walked, glancing over his shoulder as the man at the door stared after them.

“Dad,” he asked quietly. “What’s wrong with that man?”

His father sighed. "‘ _Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave_ ’. The Lord grants us the joy of love only once, maybe twice in a lifetime, Castiel,” he explained. “The man who turns it away is a fool or a genius, I’ve never been sure. Sometimes that kind of hold on a man is the thing that breaks him in the long run.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quoted: Song of Songs 8:6


	2. Chapter 2

The second time Castiel visited the farm that sat alongside the road out of town, he was fifteen years old. His father had been buried for three long years by then, struck down at his desk with a stroke that led him to a sleep from which he never would awake. The church had changed then, with Uncle Zacariah taking the helm and leading the flock down a new path. His latest brainstorm had been to take the message to the people, leaving the pulpit behind for the saved and focusing on bring the rest into the fold. By then, the Winchester house was something of a spectacle, if not a blight, on the tiny rural town.

The roof had never been fixed, the bright blue tarp faded down to a dingy grey, newer patches of plastic tacked over it haphazardly here and there. The older boy, only twelve, had already pulled out of school – though whether it was his father who made that decision or the boy himself, no one ever knew, or at least never said. Just like they never said a word when the boy, too young for even a farm permit, drove his father’s old Chevy into town, buying groceries sometimes with nothing more than a pile of coins. Uncle Zachariah was certain that the Winchesters were broken, and needed to be saved. He seemed adamant that he and his nephew, Castiel, must do the saving.

Castiel saw the boy as they approached, and felt ridiculous in the suit that hadn’t fit right since his father’s funeral. Dean – for that was the older boy’s name, his uncle had intoned as they made their approach – eyed them warily from where he knelt at the corner of the sagging porch, pulling away rotted boards with the claw end of a hammer. Already the boy had more muscle on him than Castiel, the simple preacher’s son whose days were spent in study and prayer. Suddenly Castiel understood the haphazard look to the repairs on the house; as the skeptical green gaze of the Winchester boy’s met Castiel’s own curious blue, he realized that it must be Dean working to keep up the house.

“Dean! Dean, Dad said he would sign my permission slip to go to the zoo but he hasn’t and it’s tomorrow and I need five dollars for lunch, but Dad said to forget about it and… whoa.” A gangly boy of little more than seven years of age rounded the corner, stopping so quickly at his brother’s side that his too-long floppy brown hair blew back with the force of his own feet. 

“Sammy, go inside,” the older boy intoned, eyes still on the visitors.

“But Dean…!” he began. “I can’t go if…”

“Sammy, just go inside, we’ll figure it out later,” he hissed, turning a frown on the young boy that made him cringe. The older boy sighed, and his voice softened. “Just… don’t worry about it, we’ll… I’ll figure it out, just go inside and try not to wake Dad, okay?” The younger one gulped, then nodded, and sped into the house through a creaking screen door.

The older boy sighed, wiping his hands on his jeans before he stood. “Help you with something?” he asked, voice far too gruff and defensive for a child of his age.

“Hello, son,” Castiel’s uncle intoned. “We came out here today to spread the Word.”

The boy snorted, rolling his eyes and running his fingers through dark blonde hair, shorn too close and too uneven to have been done by anything but his own hand. “I ain’t your son, mister,” he replied. “And I don’t need your ‘Word’. Pretty sure my old man don’t need it either.”  
Uncle Zachariah smiled, and Castiel had to repress a shudder. He was never fond of his father’s brother – half-brother, if truth be told. There was something a little too bright and a little too slick about his smiles and the way he eyed people as he approached.

“Why don’t you just be a good boy, go and fetch your daddy for us to talk to?”

“DEAN!” an angry voice called out suddenly, and the boy jumped.

“Great,” he grumbled, heading back to his work at the porch. “Just get the hell out of here, would you?” he called over his shoulder.

The hollow-eyed man that had haunted Castiel’s mind for many years appeared in the doorway, looking even thinner and more gaunt than the first time Castiel had met him. He glared out over the preacher and his nephew, even as Uncle Zachariah flashed another smile.

“Good afternoon, brother,” the preacher called out.

“Get off my property,” the elder Winchester responded with a flat dull gaze. “Get the hell out before I have to run you out myself. We don’t need your church and we don’t need your charity.”

“Everyone needs the Word, brother,” Uncle Zachariah interrupted, to no avail.

The man just glared. “You come back this way, I’ll shoot you sooner than talk. Get the hell out.” He turned and stomped back into the depths of the old house, shouting something to his younger son as he went. Dean glanced over at them, but said nothing.

Uncle Zachariah sighed and shook his head, turning to stalk away. “Some people just don’t want to be saved,” he groused. 

Castiel moved to follow, and then paused, hand slipping into his pocket as he stood on the gravel drive that led back to the main road. There was a crisp five dollar bill folded neatly in his wallet, his allowance for the whole month. It wasn’t much, especially not for a fifteen year old boy, but it would get him into the cheap show at least twice, and give him an extra dollar for a soda or a candy bar after school.

It really wasn’t much.

He turned on his heel and headed back towards the boy working at the porch, pulling the money out quickly and offering it without so much as a word. Dean’s eyebrows shot up, lips parting in surprise, before a hardness came back to his eyes and he shook his head.

“We don’t need charity,” he said, repeating his father’s declaration.

Castiel shook his head. “It’s not…” he started, then paused. “My cousin – my baby cousin, Anna,” he explained. “She just started school here, just moved here. S’posed to go on the field trip tomorrow, but she’s scared. Doesn’t know anyone. Maybe… maybe if your brother went, he could, you know… keep an eye on her?”

Dean eyed him cautiously, clearly torn. Castiel knew then, knew absolutely even if he didn’t know how he knew, that if the money were for anything or anyone other than the younger boy, the refusal would have been repeated right away. But Dean stopped, because it was for his brother.

He sighed and reached out, his hand pausing a moment between them. “Wouldn’t owe you then, right? If Sammy, he looked after your cousin? Wouldn’t owe you, wouldn’t be… wouldn’t be a handout.”

Castiel shook his head. “You’d be doing me a favor,” he agreed.

The boy sighed again, then took the money. He frowned. “You won’t tell?” he asked.

Castiel again shook his head. “Not a word,” he agreed, and for the first time since he had laid eyes upon the other boy, all those years ago, Castiel saw him smile.


	3. Chapter 3

The third time Castiel visited the farm that sat alongside the road out of town, he was twenty-two years old. It had been years since he’d stepped foot in town, when his mother finally called, begging him home. Things just weren’t right, she had explained. She’d never pull him away from the life he had made, a life built around the years he had spent away at school, learning and growing and finally finding a comfortable place in his own skin, if she didn’t have to.

It was the church, she told him. His father’s church, built by his own grandfather, set to minister to the little rural town. To make of them one flock, with one shepherd. Something wasn’t right. The money wasn’t adding up, and it seemed old Uncle Zachariah had taken a mortgage on the church building itself – something he wasn’t even supposed to be able to do. With a sigh and brand new shiny degree in business management, Castiel had come home, determined to fix things.

Things had changed in the few short years he had been away. It wasn’t just the new lines on his mother’s face or the hair that had gone more salt than pepper on her head. The town itself seemed to feel different.

Anna was gone; she was only barely fourteen and she had run away, and no one would tell him why. Even her father, a supposed man of God, refused to even mention her name. To quell his worries over the younger girl, Castiel’s mother had whispered that the girl was healthy and safe, living with their distant cousin Gabriel in Seattle, but wouldn’t speak any more on the subject. 

“If you really need to know, you go ask that Winchester boy,” she said quietly. 

Castiel had started in surprise. “Dean Winchester?” he asked. There was only one Winchester family in town, and they had never been the friendliest of families. Castiel loved his baby cousin – always thought of her as that, the ‘baby cousin’, even as she reached her teen years – but he was so much older than the girl, and they hadn’t been very close after he’d left for college, seemingly a universe away.

His mother shook her head. “No,” she replied. “The younger boy. Sam. He’s been friends with our Anna since the first grade, he’d know what’s happened. All I have are rumors and you know it wouldn’t be Christian of me to repeat something I didn’t know to be true.”

The house looked better this time. Still old, still careworn, but it seemed more habitable, with a real roof in place and a porch made of new wood. The old Chevy that Dean used to slowly drive into town sat on the gravel drive, but it didn’t look so old anymore. The black paint gleamed in the sun and the hood was propped open, with a man clad in dark denim and a black t-shirt leaning over the engine block.

An ancient transistor radio sat on top of the car, the antennae skewed to just the right angle to pick up a classic rock station that trickled in from a larger city on the other side of the state line. As Castiel approached, he could hear the man singing every once in a while, rumbling through a few lines of an old Skynyrd song in a voice much deeper and more gruff than Castiel remembered, and yet unmistakable all the same.

He stopped a few feet away from the car and squinted in the afternoon sun. “Hello, Dean.”

The other man turned slowly, frowning a moment as he paused to wipe greasy hands on the thighs of his jeans, head cocked to the side in a curious expression. That was a good sign, Castiel thought; no instant defensive mechanism snapping into place, no glare or leery look at the approaching stranger. For a moment, the man seemed puzzled more than anything, and Castiel gave himself pause study how the other man – for he was well and truly a man now, not a little boy pretending for the sake of a neglected brother – had changed in the years that had passed since their last meeting.

The freckles were still there, dotted across the bridge of his nose and dashing across his cheeks, even to his ears, with the golden touch of an early summer tan. When he squinted, searching for recognition, and flicked a quick pink tongue across a dry bow-shaped mouth, Castiel found his eyes drawn to the movement, surprised at the fullness of the other’s lips, and at the sharply chiseled cheekbones and proud jaw. When they had last met, there had been traces of puppy fat still on that face, but now he was all too obviously grown, much taller with childhood huskiness drawn out into lean muscle. Through it all his eyes remained the same, brightly green with hints of skepticism and well-guarded intelligence just dancing in the iris. Castiel felt himself suddenly letting out a long-held breath when the other man finally smiled.

“Preacher boy,” he said, shaking his head. “Cas or something, right? Damn, man, it’s been years.” He reached out and shook Castiel’s hand, his own free hand clapped to the other’s shoulder in a surprisingly friendly and open gesture.

“Heard you ran off to some big school in Chicago,” Dean went on. “Didn’t think you’d head back out this way.”

Castiel finally smiled in return, surprised at how delighted he was that the other boy even remembered him. “Family,” he replied with a shrug, and Dean simply nodded.

“Yeah, I know how that goes,” he agreed. “So what brings you out here? Not looking to turn me off of my wicked ways again, are ya?” He arched an eyebrow at Castiel in just such a way to make the other man color slightly, a soft rose blush blooming in his cheeks; Castiel insisted to himself that it was just the heat of the day.

“I’m out of the conversion business,” he replied with a deep laugh, earning another smile from Dean. “It was actually a family issue that brought me here. I just returned and found that my cousin Anna was no longer living at home. My mother had told me that she and your brother had been quite close. I had hoped he could shed some light on the matter.”

Dean’s expression went soft and sad for a moment, but he nodded. “Yeah. I’d wondered if somebody might show up here about that. C’mon inside Cas, I’ll get you a beer and Sam can tell you what’s what.”

If Dean’s transformation had been surprising, than Sam’s was just under completely astounding. When Castiel thought of Sam Winchester – a very rare thing to cross his mind, really, though now, having become reacquainted with Dean, he thought Sam might spring to thoughts more often, if only peripherally – he thought of a gangly little boy with floppy hair, nervous expression, and clear adoration for his older brother. The nerves were gone and the hair was shorter, but the rest was still there, coupled with a few extra feet in height that left Castiel himself, respectably over six feet tall, feeling oddly dwarfed. 

“Don’t mind Jolly Green over there,” Dean said with a smirk as they sat at a lovingly battered kitchen table, amber beer bottle halfway raised to his lips. “Woke up one day with his sweatpants stopping at his knees and had me working double overtime to make sure he wasn’t going to school bare-ass naked.”

“Dean!” Sam hissed, face going the perfect shade of embarrassed teenager crimson. He pushed his older brother hard in the shoulder and ducked a reciprocal slap to his head, settling into a seat at the table across from Castiel.

“Quit your bitchin', just tell Cas what’s up with Anna,” Dean replied after downing a good quarter of his beer.

Sam frowned, chewing on his lips before speaking. “You sure it’s okay?” he asked his brother slowly. “I don’t wanna get her in any more trouble…”

Dean studied the preacher’s son across the table for a long moment before nodding slowly. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Yeah, Cas is cool. He’s just worried about the kid. Right Cas?”

Castiel nodded in return. No one in his life had ever called him ‘Cas’; there’d been a few abortive attempts nicknames throughout his lifetime, the worst of which was a week’s worth of ‘Casanova’ catcalls from his cousin Gabriel after a disastrous junior high dance. But this one, this casual shortening of the too long and too strange name his parents had gifted him with, he seemed to like.

Or maybe it was just the voice saying it.

Sam still looked unsure of the other man, who he barely remembered from childhood, but trusted in his brother’s judgment, and began.

“Everything was fine, you know? Anna was okay and everyone was real cool with it, until Ruby Cassidy walked in on her and Jo making out in the girl’s bathroom at the Harvest Carnival,” Sam explained.

Castiel frowned; he had been gone from town a long while and was never well acquainted with Anna’s friends, so none of the names struck with any familiarity. “Joe?” he echoed. “Is that a boy from your school?” He could see why Uncle Zachariah might be angry – he had always emphasized purity in his sermons, particular that of the young women in the parish – but it didn’t seem enough that Anna should run – or be sent – so far away.

Sam shook his head. “No…” he said, still somewhat unsure. He looked to his brother and Dean nodded again; Sam sighed. “Jo. Joanna Harvelle, you know? Ellen’s daughter? From the Roadhouse outside of town.”

“Oh…” Castiel replied, frowning. It took a moment, but it clicked, and his blue eyes went wide with surprise. “Oh!” he repeated.

“Yeah, her dad just about flipped his shit,” Dean added in. Clearly, the story had made the rounds in the little town, much as Castiel’s mother had been unwilling to repeat it. “Called her all sorts of names, wanted to send her to one of those camps, you know? Ones where they try and drill into your head that you’re crazy or sick or something… try and change her, reprogram her or whatever.”

“She had to get away,” Sam filled in. His eyes suddenly went wide and pleading. “Look, don’t be mad at Dean or anything, okay? I didn’t want Anna to get sent to one of those places, I’ve seen stuff about’em on the news and they’re really… they’re really fucked up.” He paused and glanced to his brother again; clearly, Sam wasn’t one to use that language often and was looking for a reprimand, but none came.

“We made a few calls and your cousin Gabe was willing to take her in,” Dean cut in. “She packed up and I drove her out to meet him halfway. It’s not my place to be messing with someone else’s family, but I can’t see letting a kid go through that kinda bullshit. So you can call the cops or tell your uncle or whatever you want, if you have to, but I know we did the right thing.” Sam nodded in agreement, chin raised up in defiance.

It was so much information; Castiel didn’t even know where or how to begin processing it. Anna, little baby Anna, being threatened with something so horrific by her own father. And Castiel knew that there was more that must have gone with it, tales of hellfire and brimstone waiting for her if she didn’t mend her ways. His lips pressed into a thin line with the fury that began to pound in his blood. Little baby Anna!

“Jesus Christ,” he finally uttered, and drank down more than half the beer that Dean had set in front of him. He shook his head, glancing at both Dean and Sam, who were eyeing him and waiting for a response. “Jesus Christ,” he repeated. “How the hell can I ever thank you? You shouldn’t have had to do that, I should have been here to take care of Anna. I knew Uncle Zach could be a bastard but I never thought… fucking hell.”

Out of nowhere, Dean grinned, his gaze so focused on Castiel’s face that the other man felt the blush rising in his cheeks again.  
“Never thought I’d hear that out of your mouth, preacher boy.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE NOTE. This chapter contains a sermon delivered by one of the characters, directly referencing and drawing conclusion from scripture. If this will offend you, please do not read. Thank you.

The last time Castiel visited the farm that sat alongside the road out of town, he was twenty-six years old. Sam had graduated high school just two days prior, and Castiel came to help pack up the last of the house before seeing Dean and Sam off on the long drive to California. It was hard for the older man to be letting his little brother go; Sam was more than just a little brother, with Dean raising the boy himself for the most part, ever since a late night electrical fire had claimed the life of their mother, and, in truth, that of their father as well.

The old man was never the same after that, Dean would sometimes say, when he and Cas would sit on the front porch of the old house and watch fireflies blinking in the fallow fields beyond the drive. A man with a broken heart couldn’t run a farm on his own, and even when Dean had grown, it was too much to take. John Winchester had quietly drank himself to death and left the raising of his youngest son to his oldest. A fool or a genius, Castiel’s father had once said. Sometimes, Dean himself was never even sure of which it was.

The house would be even quieter with Sam gone off to college and Dean, proud owner of a GED he had worked hard to earn alongside a living for him and Sam, wasn’t apt to follow. He liked the little town, even if his family name was a dirty word in some corners, but he didn’t need the old house or the land that was left gone to seed season after season.

“Doesn’t even feel like home anymore,” he had confided quietly to Castiel, and it was only a few weeks after the listing went into the local realty ads. For all his faults, Dean’s father had managed to keep the land, paid off by his own father before him, and pass it to his sons. It would be enough money to send Sam to school and give them both a little something to tuck away.

Castiel helped them pack up the place once it had sold, tossing out a decade’s worth of detritus and keeping only what was needed or well-loved. The last item into the last box was a faded photograph, pressed into a cheap frame some years before; a young John, grinning at the camera with no trace of the hollow-eyed ghoul that had come to replace him in his expression, leaning over a hospital bed where a tired but lovely Mary Winchester lay, holding in her arms the squalling bundle of joy that was Sam, with proud big brother Dean tucked neatly against her side. It had made the elder boy angry once, a long time ago, but he couldn’t hate his father anymore; not now, when he finally understood what the man had lost. Dean had smiled at the image instead, lingering over the picture a long moment before wrapping it reverently in old newspaper and laying it gently into the last box.

“Are you sure about this, Dean?” Castiel asked, worry creasing his brow as he closed and taped the final cardboard box shut for the move.

Dean only smiled in return. “Yeah, I am,” he said with a nod. He felt light as air, as though something he hadn’t even known had been pressing him into the dirt had finally been lifted from his shoulders. He slid a calloused hand over Castiel’s, where it still sat holding the last bit of tape down on the box. “Are you?”

Castiel nodded in return, a lightness in his eyes that seemed to match the airy bounce that Dean was feeling in his own soul. “Absolutely.”

 

Things at the church had not gone at all well in the years since Castiel’s return, and it was clear that Zachariah’s leadership had to be the downfall. The economy, the older man claimed. The donations just weren’t coming in as they once had, and really, it was a small congregation, so it really was to be expected. Castiel hadn’t time to refute the man’s claims before old Uncle Zachariah had pounced on him, gleefully proclaiming his nephew to be his new protégé, determined to build up membership and press Castiel into the pulpit.

For his part, Castiel was ready to preach. He understood more know, realized that truth of what his father had long ago tried to teach him, but before he could face the members of the church, he had to make whatever foulness Zachariah had brought into their church clean once again.

All it took was going over the books to find it, massive amounts of money gone missing, taken from the church’s investment accounts and from the parishioners’ weekly tithing. It seemed that even some of the church’s properties, antique bibles and a gilded chalice cup and even an ancient cross that hung in the pastor’s office, had gone missing. Uncle Zachariah had been spitting fire when Castiel’s mother had marched in to the church offices, demanding that her son be allowed to go through the church finances, and now he could plainly see why. His uncle had no legal bearing to deny it – Castiel’s father had been the signatory on all church documents and properties, and they had transferred to his mother upon the man’s death – but Castiel had a good idea why he might have tried.

All it took was a few casual inquiries around town to find out where the money had gone. Women. Gambling. A ridiculously ugly tank of a car in pearly polished gold paint, stashed away in a garage and never driven, just bought and kept and coveted. 

The confrontation came over a family dinner, and had gone much as Castiel had expected it would. Zachariah had lied and sputtered and backtracked, trying to explain away all that his nephew had discovered. 

Castiel would have none of it. “The fact of the matter, Uncle, is that you are a paid employee of the church. It is well within the board of directors’ rights to dismiss you, and my mother and I, and Mr. Singer, comprise a majority vote.” The other two board members were Zachariah himself and his son, a weak-willed boy of a man who would always vote after his father’s choice.

“Is that so?” Zachariah spat. “And for what cause, may I ask? And who will replace me?”

Castiel remained forcibly calm. “You’ve stolen from us, Uncle. You’ve sinned. You can’t lead a church if you don’t even believe what you preach. My father always intended me to follow in his footsteps, and I’m ready now. Please don’t make a fuss over this. If you leave quietly, we don’t have to press charges.”

Zachariah’s face turned three shades of purple as he stood, moving so quickly as to tip over his chair backwards. His son, Samandriel, attempted to calm him but was soundly shoved away.

“You?!” Zachariah thundered. “‘ _How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye’_!”

“ _The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose_ ,” Castiel responded, still speaking in an even tone. He too stood and his uncle was surprised to realize that the once small and thin boy, quiet and unassuming, had grown strong and tall and brave once out from beneath his thumb. “Call me what you will, but I’m not a thief, and you are not God. You’re not the one to pass judgment on me.”

“Will that Winchester trash be willing to become a pillar of salt* for your sins, Castiel?” Zachariah snarled in return. “You think I don’t know all about you? What you did at college, what you started when you came back here? Filth!”

Castiel glared, voice going deadly, blue eyes darkening like the sky before a storm. “Get out of this house,” he responded, warning evident in his tone. “Get out of this house and never come back. You are not welcome here, and you are not welcome in my church. If you come near either again, I’ll have you arrested. If you come near me, my mother, or either of the Winchesters, I won’t be held accountable, do you understand?”

Zachariah shoved the dining table forward in a final display of anger and stormed out the door, bellowing for his son to follow. Meek and mild Samandriel had flashed sympathetic eyes at his aunt and cousin before scurrying after, and Castiel breathed a sigh of relief. 

 

The following Sunday arrived and with it no small amount of trepidation for Castiel. It would be his first time at the pulpit and if his words were to resonate with the congregation, it could bring about a great deal of change. He had whispered a prayer of thanks when he saw Dean’s old Chevy rounding the corner and pulling into the driveway of the small house Castiel had taken, blocks from the church itself, just after dusk that Saturday night. Knowing that Dean would be there, seated in the pew beside Castiel’s mother and Anna, who had returned home to take a year and get to know her family again before starting college, gave him strength beyond measure.

That night Dean had held his hands and kissed each knuckle in turn, asking once again if Castiel was certain he was ready. Any doubts the preacher’s son might have had washed away with each warm press of Dean’s mouth to his skin. He was ready; there was no doubt in him now.

Many of the older parishioners who remembered Castiel from his youth were surprised but pleased to see him at the pulpit on Sunday morning. There had been no official word on Zachariah’s departure, save that the man had taken his leave, though the rumor mill was already in full force. The service went on much as usual, with singing and praise and the sacrament, before it was time for Castiel to deliver the weekly sermon.

He had stared at himself in the mirror a long while that morning, wondering just who he was to think he could bring this truth – because he knew now, knew more than anything, that it was truth, and his father would understand and love him, and that God would do the same – to the congregation. There were many who were old and set in their ways; there were many who believed in Zachariah’s hellfire. It could destroy everything that Castiel’s father, and his father’s father, had tried to build in the little town.

Here was this man, the blue eyes passed from his mother, and the dark hair that refused to ever look neat and orderly passed from his father, staring at himself and wondering if the flock would trust him to lead them if he spoke the words that were written into every pounding beat of his heart. But Castiel knew in his soul, much the way he knew the sun would rise every morning, and knew that his mother would always sing just slightly off key, and knew that Anna had come home for more than just her family, that it was the right thing to do.

Castiel took a deep breath and stood before his congregation, noting the kind smiles of those who knew him and had known his father as he looked out on the faces gathered. His eyes drifted to the second pew on the right, where his mother sat primly, one hand clasped in that of his cousin Anna, and the other in that of Dean, who looked wildly uncomfortable in a suit and tie but smiled up at him all the same.

“Many years ago, my father told me that mankind is either genius or fool in the bonds we create among ourselves,” Castiel began, deep voice resonating through the quiet church. “I didn’t understand it then, not fully. I didn’t understand how a man could watch the world collapse around him and not care any longer. How a man could look into the face of his own child and no longer see anything but the echo of a lost love.

“Because that is what creates our bonds, isn’t it? It’s family, yes, and friendship, but beneath all of that is love. The greatest gift our Creator extended to us is this love, this profound bond that we seek out amongst each other, that we allow ourselves the risk of pain, and of loss, if only to find. ‘ _Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave_ ’, my father once told me, and I didn’t realize at the time, was far too young to realize that these words were not the lament of some lovelorn poet, but the scripture, giving us permission and leave to seek out that greatest bond of love among our fellows. This gift given us from God, to find among ourselves the one in this world who can love us with even a sliver of His devotion.

“God’s greatest commandment to us has long been to love your neighbor as yourself, because our God, our creator, who put us on this paradise, had one wish for us: to find that joy He felt in our creation amongst one another. *To love our neighbor. To find someone that we love so dearly that we put their life before our own. 

“‘ _Many waters cannot quench love, nor will rivers overflow it’_ ,” Castiel went on, watching as heads in the congregation nodded in agreement to his words. He stepped from the pulpit into the aisle, his voice carrying enough to be heard by all who listened. “God’s love for us cannot be quenched, it cannot be taken away. He loves us through sin and through praise. He loves us for our faults, and for our strengths. He loves us in the same love we share together.

“I stand before you not a man who will frighten you with tales of hellfire for misdeeds, and not as a man sent to judge you for the lives you lead. I stand here as the son of a father who loved unconditionally, and trusted me to do the same. I stand here as a man who has found a love, a bond so profound as to bring with it a new understanding of the words that my father had tried to teach me, even before I could fathom what they meant. ‘ _Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm_ ’,” Castiel repeated, and stopped at the second pew on the right, resting his hand on the shoulder of the man who still looked so uncomfortable in his suit, though his smile, like his love for the preacher’s son, was unfailing. Eyes widened and a few gasps rose from the parishioners in understanding. Castiel looked down at Dean and smiled in return, though he heard the creaking pews, harsh whispers, and slamming doors as several families left in haste.

When he looked up again, Castiel was surprised and heartened to see that it was not nearly as many as he thought it would be. “‘ _Come, my beloved, let us go out into the country_ ’,” he said, voice quiet now, gaze returned to the green eyed man, who reached up to cover Castiel’s hand on his shoulder with his own. “‘ _Let us spend the night in the villages_ ’, and never hide the love that God has allowed us.”

Castiel glanced back to the flock, and gave them his warmest smile. “I ask only that you share my joy in the love God has granted me. And I promise, if you will have me, that I will do my best to keep the Word alive in all our hearts.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Italicized quotes, in order:
> 
> Luke 6:42
> 
> Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice
> 
> * Genesis 19 (Reference, not direct quote)
> 
> * Mark 12:31 (Reference, not direct quote)
> 
> Song of Solomon 8:6-7
> 
> Song of Solomon 7:11

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on [Tumblr](http://literatec.tumblr.com), if you wish.
> 
> Please do not add this, or any of my posted works, to Goodreads. Thank you.


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